Editor's Note: We revisit this brilliant 2007 film documentary by John Pilger to remind ourselves and all readers of Axis of Logic of the history of the United States in Latin America. That history was contravened by the heroic Latin American people and most recently led by men and women like Venezuela's Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías, Argentina's Cristina Elisabet Fernández, Bolivia's Evo Morales, Ecuador's Rafael Correa, Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega and Uruguay's Jose Mujica. John Pilger begins with coverage of the Revolution in Venezuela, then shows the US-backed coup in Chile and Chile today, US aggressions in Central America and the suffering and victory of the indigenous people of Bolivia. 

The film is being broadcast again tonight across Latin America by TeleSur, via satellite, to remind all Latin Americans of their history and what gave birth to the Bolivarian Revolution. We are all indebted to John Pilger for his courage, intelligence and perserverence as one of the world's few investigative journalists, delivering truth to power around the world. This Sunday, April 14, 2013 a new election will be held in which Nicolas Maduro is expected to win by a wide margin and to carry the Bolivarian Revolution forward for at least the next six years. Today, April 13 marks the 3rd day of the 11th anniversary of the failed coup against the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela in 2002. 

 If you click on the small square in lower
right corner you can watch this in full screen.

- Les Blough in Venezuela

Summary and Credits: 'The War On Democracy' (2007) was John Pilger's first for cinema. It explores the current and past relationship of Washington with Latin American countries such as Venezuela, Bolivia and Chile.

Using archive footage sourced by Michael Moore's archivist Carl Deal, the film shows how serial US intervention, overt and covert, has toppled a series of legitimate governments in the Latin American region since the 1950s. The democratically elected Chilean government of Salvador Allende, for example, was ousted by a US backed coup in 1973 and replaced by the military dictatorship of General Pinochet. Guatemala, Panama, Nicaragua, Honduras and El Salvador have all been invaded by the United States.

John Pilger interviews several ex-CIA agents who took part in secret campaigns against democratic countries in the region. He investigates the School of the Americas in the US state of Georgia, where Pinochet's torture squads were trained along with tyrants and death squad leaders in Haiti, El Salvador, Brazil and Argentina.

The film unearths the real story behind the attempted overthrow of Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez in 2002 and how the people of the barrios of Caracas rose up to force his return to power.

It also looks at the wider rise of populist governments across South America lead by indigenous leaders intent on loosening the shackles of Washington and a fairer redistribution of the continent's natural wealth.

John Pilger says: "[The film] is about the struggle of people to free themselves from a modern form of slavery". These people, he says, "describe a world not as American presidents like to see it as useful or expendable, they describe the power of courage and humanity among people with next to nothing. They reclaim noble words like democracy, freedom, liberation, justice, and in doing so they are defending the most basic human rights of all of us in a war being waged against all of us."

'The War On Democracy' was a Youngheart Entertainment, Granada and Michael Watt production. It was released in UK cinemas on 15 June 2007 and broadcast on ITV1, 20 August 2007. Directors: John Pilger and Chris Martin. Producers: Chris Martin and Wayne Young. Editor: Joe Frost. The film was made with the support of the humanitarian financier Michael Watt.

Awards: Best Documentary Award, 2008 One World Awards, London. The panel's citation read: "There are six criteria the judges are asked to use to select the winner of this award: the film's impact on public opinion, its appeal to a wide audience, its inclusion of voices from the developing world, its high journalistic or production standards, its success in conveying the impact of the actions of the world's rich on the lives of the poor and the extent to which it draws attention to possible solutions. One film met every one of these. It was the winner of the award: John Pilger's 'The War on Democracy'."